Samsung steps into fitness tracking market with the Gear Fit

Samsung kicked off its Mobile World Conference announcements with the new Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo a few hours ago. But the company kept mum on another wearable technology device until just now: the Gear Fit. The latter is a smaller version of the Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo smart watches that drops features like a camera, microphone, or speaker to focus squarely on fitness tracking -- in other words, this one’s taking on Fitbit.

The Gear Fit boasts a 1.84-inch rectangular, curved AMOLED touchscreen panel with 432x128 resolution and is fitted into an interchangeable rubber strap. A heart rate sensor is on the underside, which can be left active over extended periods, and can synchronize the data with Samsung's S Health apps on Galaxy smartphones via Bluetooth 4.0 LE. It can also track your steps, calories burned, monitor sleep and Samsung talked about a real-time fitness coach that will encourage you to speed up or slow down depending on your physical activity.

Its curved screen will handle more than just displaying fitness data, though. Samsung says that -- provided you pair this with one of 20 compatible Galaxy devices -- you’ll get notifications for calls, emails, SMS, alarms and S-Planner events. Samsung also says the platform is open to third party app notifications.

Like the new Galaxy S5 and Gear smart watches, the Gear Fit is IP67 rated for water and dust resistance. It weights just 27 grams and will arrive in black, gray, and orange colors come April 11. Samsung says the Fit as well as the new Gear 2 smart watches will last up to three days between charges

Although Samsung didn’t mention much about the underlying software, reports indicate the company isn’t relying on Google’s Android software for the Fit, nor is it using the same Tizen software powering its Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo siblings. Instead, it runs the company’s proprietary RTOS (real-time OS).